Friday, October 3rd, 2008 at 8:00 am  |  291 responses

SLAMonline Top 50: Tony Parker, no. 21

The definitive ranking of the best players in the NBA today…

by Jake Appleman

Basketball is a game of flow and movement. It’s a strange combination of dance and science. Point guards, especially good point guards, lead this dance/science, creating the initial actions that often dictate long sequences of play, and the corresponding reactions. Tony Parker is one of these good—very, very good, in fact—point guards.

He might not have the savvy of Nash, the slobbering-at-the-feet-of-his-game-like-he’s-a-basketball-Buddha respect of Kidd, the bull doggedness of D-Will, or the explosive omnipotence of CP3, but he’s right there with those guys at the top of the point guard class, and he’s gotten better grades in winning than any of them.

Despite the fact that his digits would indicate that he took his 3-ball—along with the judiciousness that comes with taking said 3’s—and broke it, it’s a relatively small sample size, so we won’t really dwell. What we will dwell on is that in game 3 of the Conference Semis, with his team staring down a 0-2 hole, he dropped 31 and 11, putting a damper on CP3 and his team’s Honeybuzz. That win began the 4 out of 5 resurgence that would be the highlight of his squad’s season, approximately a year after TP was named Finals MVP.

Parker, and the blistering speed that is part and parcel of his penetration’s dominance, is a vital cog in the NBA’s most consistently well-oiled machine. That’s not to be taken lightly. His ability to put the ball in the basket at a 50 percent clip sets the efficient tone for the rest of his squad. He ignites an underrated fast break when the Spurs do run and, as mentioned above, initiates flow sequences beneficial to the rest of his teammates, be they Tim Duncan in the post or Bruce Bowen releasing a corner three ball.

What would be the point of a muderous robot destroyer if it didn’t have the speed to chase you down in the back of an alley and ram its physical violence down your throat as it matter-of-factly beat the crap out of you.

(Apropos of nothing relating to the rest of this post, he and his wife, Mexican-American desperate housewife, Eva Longoria, are reportedly expecting their first child, Speedy Gonzalez Longoria Parker, this spring.)

And while the squad may be aging, it’s an odd year and people are sleeping on the Spurs again. Would it be out of the realm of possiblity for TP to pick up a second NBA Finals MVP trophy?

Nope.

Want more of the SLAMonline Top 50? Check out the archive.

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  • http://www.myspace.com/freedmusic Fredd

    Kostas Tsartsaris, look at the last games with France .. Parker was unbelievable … really good, haters or not … just maybe France have more than 10 guys in the NBA but just 3 of them ( including Parker ) were with Team France … ( Turiaf and Diawara ) … so … he had really done is best … he’s not his fault when all the other guys on hte team were making all those bricks …

  • danielj1

    terrible terrible ranking…no way hes better than bosh, brand or johnson…not even billups man.

  • Kyuui-musikq

    Lol, anyone who calls their own article definitive, has to be an egotistical airhead. Tony Parker is unbelievable. Also, anyone who calls TP overated best shut up and stop making a fool of themselves. Anyone whos played major part of 3 rings in 6 seasons is bottom line elite. As far as his place in the listing, sure, you could make the argument that Bosh has a better all around game, bu it wouldn’t much ground when considering everything else that places a player on this list. TP is a game changer! A winner and plays big when it counts. When the hell have the raptors ever ridden Bosh to playoff victory?

  • http://www.freewebs.com/betcats BETCATS

    wickty wickity wack

  • MeloMan13

    Parker better than Bosh? i think not

  • http://www.nba.com/celtics/ Moose

    Parker better than Bosh? i think so

  • http://www.freewebs.com/betcats BETCATS

    Moose!!

  • http://www.nba.com/celtics/ Moose

    He BET, what’s good???

  • http://www.nba.com/celtics/ Moose

    *hey

  • http://www.freewebs.com/betcats BETCATS

    I am gonna go moose hunting

  • http://www.nba.com/celtics/ Moose

    that would not be cool . . . cause then you’d be hatin on canada rite BETCATS?

  • http://www.freewebs.com/betcats BETCATS

    *right

  • http://www.freewebs.com/betcats BETCATS

    that correction was for you Moose. You are spellin like a deer tonight

  • http://www.nba.com/celtics/ Moose

    hows the go in raleigh, BET?

  • http://www.nba.com/celtics/ Moose

    BET, i’m always spellin like a moose. ain’t no deers in here.

  • http://www.freewebs.com/betcats BETCATS

    Im just chillin like chile

  • http://www.nba.com/celtics/ Moose

    you microwave the chili, BET. that stuffs hot.

  • http://www.freewebs.com/betcats BETCATS

    ^liar. But i wouldnt know, i dont eat it. I am ouut

  • http://www.nba.com/celtics/ Moose

    i don’t either, BET. but i know that. I’m out too . . .

  • emney

    i think tony parker is better than the ranking he’s been given. i have yet 2 see a point guard in the Nba truly shut down tony, not even CP3 could lock him up. but it was a great battle 2 watch.

  • Anton

    I’ll take Shaq over this frenchie

  • http://www.nba.com/celtics/ Moose

    Anton, what the heck are you talking about??? First of all, you are comparing apples to oranges. Shaq is a big man, 7 foot 1, and Tony Parker is 6-2. O’Neal is a center, and Parker is a point guard. Shaq, right now, kinda sucks, to tell you the truth. He is still a dominant big, but he can’t play with the rest of them anymore. And why has it taken you about 15 spots to complain???

  • the truth 34

    Moose is a beast.

  • MeloMan13

    Bosh can carry a team single handedly to the playoffs, parker cannot

  • http://nba.com/celtics Moose

    MeloMan, Parker has other players to share the numbers with. Bosh is the only big option in Toronto, whereas the Spurs have a ton of guys. Parker can’t singlehandedly bring the Spurs to the playoffs, because other guys are willing to help.

  • Teddy-the-Bear

    Good spot, I think.

  • Teddy-the-Bear

    Though there are a few players I would take over him, like Billups or Bosh. On a side note — Personally, I would have Richard Hamilton way higher on this list as well.

  • http://www.jcherot.blogspot.com Tripset30

    I can understand why people would think Parker’s overrated, but he’s impossible to keep out of the lane at 5’13″, and he FINISHES. He’ll never lead the league in assists, but his three rings are a testament to how good of a point guard he is.

  • Eric

    Why are some of you surprised? He was going to make the Top 50 list. He’s a frickin Finals MVP!

  • Dark

    I used to think TP was overrated, especially when he got all the post-Finals MVP hype. At the end of last season/playoffs, he really looked like a top 5 point guard, because he consistently held his own CP3 and Nash, something I couldn’t say about him before. Now his midrange jumper’s money, his drives are more controlled, and he’s distributing way better than he did in years before. He’s gotten better every year.

  • Teddy-the-Bear

    Not to mention Parker has a razor sharp tear drop.

  • http://www.lkz.ch/basket Darksaber

    And one of the best contact basket makers i’ve ever seen. Especially at high speed / impossible angles. (Manu and Wade are probably the best in that category btw.)

  • Kostas Tsartsaris

    @Allenp…:i think you wrote that Iverson has had as much playoff success as Barkley….read again what i wrote at least 2 times(slowly…)

  • Kostas Tsartsaris

    @Darksaber-Dark-Teddy…:exactly.

  • Kostas Tsartsaris

    @Fredd….:i grew up watching debuisson and ricar dacouri living their bodies on the flour for a team that never gave up..France was playing this way up until 2000. After antuan Rigondo left them and Parker became the clear leader it seems to me that the team lost its identity…of course Parker is by far the most talented player so they couldn’t do otherwise but it remains true that the team isn’t fighting they it used to do…

  • http://mykal1.blogspot.com/ MyKal

    Man, Kostas, you got some enemies in this place. Probably because of how B-Ball nuts get defensive when their idols are attacked by people with warped views of the NBA and its workings, namely, YOU. Sorry K, (I’m gonna call you that from now on) I’m still trying to digest your Iverson claims.

  • http://www.myspace.com/freedmusic Fredd

    @KOSTAS: great to hear the names of dacoury, rigaudeau, dubuisson again ! : ) … so we ‘re in a way agree, there’s no identity in that Team France but it does not mean Parker is not a leader in his blood … to lead you must have players to lead … you know what I mean.

  • MeloMan13

    Moose: if u take both parker and bosh and put them each on a team with equally crap players, Bosh’s team will win

  • CL SMOOTH

    Some of these rankings, like this one, are ridiculous. He’s a good player, but 21, that’s a Reed Richards stretch of the imagination.

  • Irfan

    One year later, did the haters shut up ?
    What was astonishing with Parker ranked 21st, was that in no way he was under Arenas or Iverson last year. Everybody could see it, but American fans and journalists are still prejudiced against foreign players.

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